Wednesday, March 07, 2007
Culture of hitting + lack of respect = cheap shots
A couple of months ago while appearing on the Ottawa Senators pre game show on radio station TEAM 1200, TSN’s Bob McKenzie hit the nail right on the head with regards to the body checks or more to the point the type of body checks that are being dished out by today’s NHL players. To quote, “the culture of hitting is different now than what it was 15, 20 or 25 years ago,” exclaimed McKenzie. And he was bang on ladies and gentlemen. In today’s game a player will take an opportunity to finish a hit no matter what the situation or the vulnerability of the player on the receiving end. Not so ‘back in the day.’ If a co-captain of any team had been hit the way Chris Drury was by Chris Neil you would have had an all out bench clearing brawl in five seconds in any era of the NHL prior to 1990. Chris Neil would have known that going in and perhaps, like his predecessors he would have held off smoking Drury, perhaps not. Neil is a physical player who enjoys it, has been quoted that he likes to hit to hurt and my guess is that he’s more than willing to be as accountable as anybody wants to try and make him. Having said that, I whole heartedly endorse Lindy Ruff’s response in sending out his tough guys – I would have done it a bit differently however. I simply would have waited for Chris Neil to finish serving his major for fighting Stafford and would have instructed Andrew Peters and Co. to go get him then rather than try and get something going with Dany Heatley, Jason Spezza, etc.
Naturally there was quite a bit of verbiage regarding this situation. Here’s my view of the whole thing. If I were the Buffalo owner I would have offered Lindy Ruff a contract extension immediately following the game. The longest serving coach currently in the NHL made an immediate statement with the players he sent out on the next shift. His responsibility as a coach is to his team and his organization and his response was noted by everybody in that organization. Further more neither Adam Mair or Andrew Peters continued to fight Jason Spezza or Dany Heatley after they showed they were less than interested in throwing the knuckles and good for all parties on that front. This is why Peters made a beeline for Ottawa goalie Ray Emery after his easy dismissal of Martin Biron. Everybody in hockey knows of Emery’s reputation and he was not the first nor will he be the last goaltender to fight a position player in the NHL. Still, somebody, anybody should have jumped in on Emery’s behalf as Peter’s was winging the right hands in even though very few if any actually landed. The optics of the whole situation from the Neil hit right through the Peters-Emery tilt was not good for the Senators or their fans.
Part two. The rematch. I was at that game, three rows off the ice. Brian McGratton was worth the price of admission in the warm up alone. His tilt with Peters was preceded by a near Peters-Redden tussle that undoubtedly was not going to erupt into something major but with McGratton on the ice it had no chance to really start anyway and that’s why you want him out there. McGratton took a huge shot early in that fight and did not go down. In fact he came back to get the decision which was followed just minutes later by a Chris Neil –Adam Mair bout clearly won by Neil. Ottawa blew a 4-1 and a 5-3 lead in that game but hung on for a 6-5 victory but who cares? Lindy Ruff was quoted as saying after the Thursday game, ‘that he could care less if they had of lost the game 10-1,’ the team made a statement, he initiated it, and he endorsed it and fully supported it. His counter part Bryan Murray responded in kind on Saturday night by dressing McGratton and it was a classic. You could cut the atmosphere with a knife in the building and to be honest it felt like being in the Montreal Forum on a Saturday night as they were getting ready to play Boston or Philly in the 1970’s. That’s what hockey is all about. Emotion, instant reaction, accountability, nastiness and sometimes uncontrolled violence. All tree huggers please exit stage door left. Take your drinks with straws in them with you.
In an interview I did with Pierre Pilote several years ago he told me that he tried at least once a game to hit a guy so hard that he’d have to be carried off on a stretcher. Most of you probably never heard of Mr. Pilote. He won the Stanley Cup in 1961 with Chicago and was a three time recipient of the James Norris Trophy as the top defenseman in the NHL. He was an incredible defenseman. The very nature of hockey dictates that there are going to be flare-ups that sometimes are brutal in nature. What the league needs to realize is that in the anti septic makeover of the NHL they have eradicated almost all levels of respect and the very nature of their rule changes (instigator penalty, defensemen restricted in playing the body, retaliators penalized rather than original cheap shot artists) have contrived to create a terrible mess that will have at some point in the not to distant future a scene that will make the Todd Bertuzzi-Steve Moore incident look like a boy scout get together. Give the accountability back to the players. Penalize blind side hits to the head and let the defensemen play the body like they used to. Cam Janssen’s hit on Tomas Kaberle of the Leafs was a late hit and I have no problem with the suspension but again – if this were in the era I grew up watching and say that was the Flyers Dave Schultz hitting Montreal’s John Van Boxmeer with a late shot you would have had a war on your hands. Wait a minute…………that happened in 1974. In fact I have the incident on tape. Montreal historians point to that moment as the coming out party of Larry Robinson or the coming together of the organization that would go on to win four straight Stanley Cups. Buffalo personnel are making similar statements for their team’s reaction to the Drury hit by Chris Neil.
I love the skill players and all they bring to the game. I also love the fact that I grew up in a time when they could be protected by their peers. It was a better league and believe it or not a much cleaner league. Any comments, send ‘em on. Love to hear them.
Liam Maguire
Naturally there was quite a bit of verbiage regarding this situation. Here’s my view of the whole thing. If I were the Buffalo owner I would have offered Lindy Ruff a contract extension immediately following the game. The longest serving coach currently in the NHL made an immediate statement with the players he sent out on the next shift. His responsibility as a coach is to his team and his organization and his response was noted by everybody in that organization. Further more neither Adam Mair or Andrew Peters continued to fight Jason Spezza or Dany Heatley after they showed they were less than interested in throwing the knuckles and good for all parties on that front. This is why Peters made a beeline for Ottawa goalie Ray Emery after his easy dismissal of Martin Biron. Everybody in hockey knows of Emery’s reputation and he was not the first nor will he be the last goaltender to fight a position player in the NHL. Still, somebody, anybody should have jumped in on Emery’s behalf as Peter’s was winging the right hands in even though very few if any actually landed. The optics of the whole situation from the Neil hit right through the Peters-Emery tilt was not good for the Senators or their fans.
Part two. The rematch. I was at that game, three rows off the ice. Brian McGratton was worth the price of admission in the warm up alone. His tilt with Peters was preceded by a near Peters-Redden tussle that undoubtedly was not going to erupt into something major but with McGratton on the ice it had no chance to really start anyway and that’s why you want him out there. McGratton took a huge shot early in that fight and did not go down. In fact he came back to get the decision which was followed just minutes later by a Chris Neil –Adam Mair bout clearly won by Neil. Ottawa blew a 4-1 and a 5-3 lead in that game but hung on for a 6-5 victory but who cares? Lindy Ruff was quoted as saying after the Thursday game, ‘that he could care less if they had of lost the game 10-1,’ the team made a statement, he initiated it, and he endorsed it and fully supported it. His counter part Bryan Murray responded in kind on Saturday night by dressing McGratton and it was a classic. You could cut the atmosphere with a knife in the building and to be honest it felt like being in the Montreal Forum on a Saturday night as they were getting ready to play Boston or Philly in the 1970’s. That’s what hockey is all about. Emotion, instant reaction, accountability, nastiness and sometimes uncontrolled violence. All tree huggers please exit stage door left. Take your drinks with straws in them with you.
In an interview I did with Pierre Pilote several years ago he told me that he tried at least once a game to hit a guy so hard that he’d have to be carried off on a stretcher. Most of you probably never heard of Mr. Pilote. He won the Stanley Cup in 1961 with Chicago and was a three time recipient of the James Norris Trophy as the top defenseman in the NHL. He was an incredible defenseman. The very nature of hockey dictates that there are going to be flare-ups that sometimes are brutal in nature. What the league needs to realize is that in the anti septic makeover of the NHL they have eradicated almost all levels of respect and the very nature of their rule changes (instigator penalty, defensemen restricted in playing the body, retaliators penalized rather than original cheap shot artists) have contrived to create a terrible mess that will have at some point in the not to distant future a scene that will make the Todd Bertuzzi-Steve Moore incident look like a boy scout get together. Give the accountability back to the players. Penalize blind side hits to the head and let the defensemen play the body like they used to. Cam Janssen’s hit on Tomas Kaberle of the Leafs was a late hit and I have no problem with the suspension but again – if this were in the era I grew up watching and say that was the Flyers Dave Schultz hitting Montreal’s John Van Boxmeer with a late shot you would have had a war on your hands. Wait a minute…………that happened in 1974. In fact I have the incident on tape. Montreal historians point to that moment as the coming out party of Larry Robinson or the coming together of the organization that would go on to win four straight Stanley Cups. Buffalo personnel are making similar statements for their team’s reaction to the Drury hit by Chris Neil.
I love the skill players and all they bring to the game. I also love the fact that I grew up in a time when they could be protected by their peers. It was a better league and believe it or not a much cleaner league. Any comments, send ‘em on. Love to hear them.
Liam Maguire
# posted by Liam Maguire @ 11:57 AM 
